Western resolve to curtail Russian uranium trade gains momentum

Although the Russian aggression against Ukraine has been ongoing for over two years – and counting from the secession of Donbas – for over a decade, many Western democracies still finance Vladimir Putin's regime by purchasing strategic raw materials from Russia. This includes the United States, which in May 2024 placed the largest order for Russian uranium in over a year.

The May purchase of Russian uranium cost the United States over USD 209 million and was the largest since spring 2023. While the war in Ukraine has had many economic repercussions, not all industries have felt them in the same way.

As the West imposes further sanctions on Russia, there is an area where cooperation is not only surviving but has seen exceptional growth since 2022. This area is the global trade of enriched uranium – a raw material essential for nuclear energy.

On a global scale, Kazakhstan is the largest exporter of uranium, with leading positions also held by countries such as Namibia, Niger, Australia, and Canada. However, different countries pull the strings in the international market. This is because uranium, or rather its ore, is just a raw material that is not very different from other natural resources exploited by the mining industry.

After extraction from the ground, uranium ore undergoes a processing procedure that results in a semi-product called yellowcake. It contains the non-fissionable isotope U-238 (99.3 percent) and the fissionable U-235, as well as trace amounts of the isotope U-234. Initially, the percentage content of U-235 is limited to about 0.7 percent. To increase its value and significance, this percentage needs to be increased, a process known as uranium enrichment.

A byproduct of this process is U-238, or depleted uranium. Due to its high density, it is used in the armour of specialized tanks like Abrams and in certain types of ammunition, where it forms components such as penetrators for anti-tank rounds.

The most common method of uranium enrichment is the use of centrifuges, where centrifugal force leads to the separation of U-235, which being lighter, remains in the central part of the centrifuge, from U-238, which being heavier, collects near its walls.

This process requires extensive infrastructure and strict supervision, and its effects – apart from uranium production – include significant amounts of waste, some of which require storage planning for millennia.

These issues – rather than technological superiority – have caused global production of enriched uranium to be dominated by countries ignoring environmental costs, such as Russia and China.

The widely publicized sale of Russian uranium to the United States is not only a business but also – and perhaps primarily – a propaganda success for the Kremlin. The information about American orders is heavily amplified by Russian propaganda.

While Putin’s propagandists may celebrate this success, it seems that supplying America with uranium is their swan song. The raw material dependency of the free world on countries not aligned with liberal democracy is a fact, but over two years of Russian attacks on Ukraine have proven to be a long enough period for changes in logistics chains to start working. This also applies to uranium.

In April 2024, the United States announced the first – albeit very modest – batch of its own enriched uranium produced in Ohio. Although 198 pounds is a homeopathic amount compared to the total country’s needs, estimated at over 19,800 short tons, it heralds forthcoming changes. Especially since it is accompanied by a recently introduced ban on uranium imports from Russia.

Although it comes with several caveats, it demonstrates the political will to end the dependency on Russia. This also applies – albeit to a lesser extent – to Europe, whose growing capacities in uranium enrichment have worried Moscow to the point of supporting a coup d'état in Niger, attempting to destabilize the supply of this strategic raw material to countries like France.

The marginalization of Russia's role in the global uranium trade seems inevitable. A coalition of Western countries and Japan has decided to spend billions of dollars on expanding their capabilities for uranium enrichment.

Another blow to Putin came from the United Kingdom, which has decided to open the first plant in Europe for producing highly enriched uranium, a raw material that until now was exclusively supplied by Russia. Although the effects of these actions will become visible only after years, the process of pushing Russia out of the global uranium market has already begun.